BON Loyalty Program & Rewards vs. 99minds Gift Card & Loyalty: A Strategic Analysis

Introduction

Selecting the right retention tools for a Shopify storefront often involves balancing specialized features against the complexity of the store’s technical stack. Merchants must decide whether to invest in a platform focused heavily on reward points and VIP tiers or one that bridges the gap between gift card management and customer loyalty. The choice impacts not only the immediate customer experience but also the long-term operational efficiency of the marketing team.

Short answer: BON Loyalty Program & Rewards is a robust choice for merchants prioritizing multi-language support and B2B-specific loyalty tiers, while 99minds Gift Card & Loyalty excels for brands needing a unified system for gift cards, store credit, and automated refund workflows. Selecting an integrated solution often helps reduce the technical debt associated with managing multiple disparate applications.

This analysis provides a feature-by-feature comparison of BON Loyalty Program & Rewards and 99minds Gift Card & Loyalty. By examining their strengths, pricing structures, and integration capabilities, merchants can determine which solution aligns with their growth objectives and technical requirements.

BON Loyalty Program & Rewards vs. 99minds Gift Card & Loyalty: At a Glance

A Detailed Analysis of Feature Sets and Operational Impact

Understanding the functional differences between these two applications requires a look at how they handle the various stages of the customer lifecycle. While both aim to improve retention, their primary mechanisms for doing so differ significantly.

Core Loyalty and Reward Mechanisms

BON Loyalty Program & Rewards focuses on a traditional but highly customizable loyalty structure. It allows merchants to establish a points-based system where customers earn rewards for specific actions. A standout feature is the VIP Tier program, which enables brands to create levels of membership that offer accelerated point earning or exclusive rewards. This is particularly effective for high-growth brands looking to gamify the shopping experience.

For merchants operating in the wholesale space, BON Loyalty provides a B2B Tier Program. This functionality is essential for stores that have different pricing and reward logic for retail customers versus business partners. By segregating these audiences, a brand can maintain its retail margins while offering the necessary incentives to keep wholesale buyers coming back.

99minds Gift Card & Loyalty takes a slightly different approach by blending loyalty with financial instruments like gift cards and store credit. While it offers a loyalty program that can be set up quickly, its strength lies in the versatility of its rewards. Instead of only offering percentage-off or dollar-off coupons, 99minds allows for the creation of both physical and electronic gift cards. This is a critical distinction for stores that have a physical presence or those that want to offer more "giftable" rewards that feel like currency rather than a simple discount code.

Managing Referrals and Customer Advocacy

Both applications include referral programs, but the implementation reflects their individual philosophies. BON Loyalty features an "Anti-Cheat" referral program designed to prevent self-referrals and fraudulent point accumulation. This security layer is vital for stores with high-value rewards where the incentive for bad actors is significant. The automated emails for referrals help keep the momentum going without manual intervention from the store owner.

99minds emphasizes personalized customer referrals. By allowing for tailored referral experiences, the app helps brands maintain their voice during the advocacy process. Because 99minds also handles store credit, referrals can be rewarded directly with account balances, which often feels more seamless to a customer than receiving a one-time use coupon code.

Customization, Branding, and User Experience

BON Loyalty places a heavy emphasis on the visual and technical customization of the loyalty experience. On its Growth plan, merchants can unlock custom CSS with developer support, ensuring the loyalty widget and page match the brand's aesthetic perfectly. For even more advanced needs, the Professional plan offers a Software Development Toolkit (SDK) and full API access. This is particularly relevant for brands using Headless commerce (Hydrogen) or those requiring deep integration with a custom-built storefront.

The ability to offer a multi-language display is another significant advantage for BON Loyalty. For stores selling in Europe, Asia, or other regions with diverse language requirements, having a loyalty program that translates automatically is a non-negotiable requirement for maintaining a professional user experience.

99minds focuses on ease of use, advertising a "no coding skills required" setup. The workflow-based automation allows merchants to create, trigger, and automate rewards based on specific customer actions. This logic-based approach simplifies the management of the program, making it easier for a marketing team to adjust campaigns on the fly without needing a developer.

Returns, Refunds, and Store Credit Workflows

A major point of differentiation for 99minds Gift Card & Loyalty is its handling of returns and refunds. In many e-commerce setups, returns are a point of friction and lost revenue. 99minds attempts to solve this by automating refunds through store credit. Instead of a customer taking a cash refund and leaving the ecosystem, the merchant can offer store credit as a reward or a substitute. This keeps the capital within the business and encourages a future purchase.

BON Loyalty does not specify advanced refund or store credit management in the provided data. Its focus remains squarely on the earning and redemption of points. For a merchant whose primary goal is to reduce the "leakage" caused by returns, the 99minds feature set provides a strategic advantage that a standard loyalty app might lack.

Pricing Structure and Value for Money

BON Loyalty provides a transparent, tiered pricing model that scales with the complexity of the store.

• The Free Forever plan is generous, offering points, rewards, and the anti-cheat referral program.
• The Basic plan ($25/month) adds essential features like a dedicated loyalty page, POS rewards, and multi-language support.
• The Growth plan ($99/month) is aimed at scaling stores, removing order limits and adding VIP tiers and B2B functionality.
• The Professional plan ($349/month) targets enterprise-level stores requiring API access and priority support.

When comparing plan fit against retention goals, merchants must consider if the B2B or multi-language features justify the jump to higher tiers.

For 99minds Gift Card & Loyalty, the specific pricing details are not specified in the provided data. However, the app positions itself as a way to "substitute multiple apps with 1 powerful app." The value proposition here is consolidation. By combining gift cards, store credit, and loyalty, a merchant may be able to justify a higher price point by canceling other subscriptions.

Integrations and Ecosystem Compatibility

A loyalty program is only as effective as the data it shares with other marketing tools. Both apps show strong compatibility with the Shopify ecosystem, but their "Works With" lists highlight different priorities.

BON Loyalty integrates with several popular product review apps, including Fera, LAI, and Judge.me. This is crucial because it allows merchants to reward customers for leaving reviews, effectively using the loyalty program to build social proof. It also integrates with PageFly for landing page building and Klaviyo for email and SMS marketing.

99minds has a broader range of CRM and marketing automation integrations listed, including Hubspot, Mailchimp, Active Campaign, and DotDigital, alongside Klaviyo and Omnisend. This makes it a strong contender for stores that use sophisticated marketing stacks outside of the standard Shopify/Klaviyo pairing. Its integration with Shopify Flow further enables complex, automated workflows that can trigger actions in other apps based on gift card or loyalty events.

Both apps support Shopify POS, which is a major benefit for omnichannel retailers. Rewarding in-store customers with the same points or store credit they earn online creates a unified brand experience that is often difficult to achieve with basic tools.

Reliability and Trust Signals

When confirming the install path used by Shopify merchants, ratings and review counts serve as primary indicators of stability and support quality.

99minds Gift Card & Loyalty has 33 reviews with a perfect 5.0 rating. This suggests a consistent track record of satisfying a small but dedicated group of users. The presence of physical gift card support and refund automation indicates that the app is likely used by established businesses with more complex logistical needs.

BON Loyalty Program & Rewards also maintains a 5.0 rating, though it currently only has 1 review in the provided data. While the feature list is extensive and includes sophisticated enterprise options like Hydrogen support and full API access, the lower review volume means prospective users may want to engage with their 24/7 live chat support to verify how the app performs under high volume.

The Alternative: Solving App Fatigue with an All-in-One Platform

As a Shopify store grows, the temptation to add specialized apps for every new requirement often leads to a phenomenon known as "app fatigue." Each new tool added to the stack—whether for loyalty, reviews, gift cards, or referrals—introduces a new set of challenges. These include fragmented data silos where the loyalty app doesn't talk to the review app, inconsistent user interfaces that confuse customers, and a cumulative drag on site performance.

This tool sprawl also has a financial impact. While a single app might seem affordable, the total cost of ownership across five or six different subscriptions can quickly exceed the cost of a single, unified platform. This is where the philosophy of "More Growth, Less Stack" becomes essential for sustainable scaling.

Growave provides an alternative to this fragmented approach by integrating several key retention modules into a single infrastructure. Instead of managing BON for loyalty and another app for social proof, merchants can find loyalty points and rewards designed to lift repeat purchases seamlessly connected to their review and wishlist systems. This integration ensures that when a customer leaves a review, their points are updated instantly, and their VIP status is reflected across every touchpoint without needing complex third-party connectors.

The benefit of an integrated platform extends to the customer experience. A single dashboard and a consistent design language mean the customer feels they are interacting with the brand, not a collection of third-party widgets. For the merchant, it means having a single source of truth for customer data.

If consolidating tools is a priority, start by selecting plans that reduce stacked tooling costs. By moving away from a siloed approach, teams can spend less time managing integrations and more time on strategy.

Growave’s modular design allows brands to use VIP tiers and incentives for high-intent customers alongside robust social proof features. For instance, collecting and showcasing authentic customer reviews becomes a natural extension of the loyalty program. When rewards are tied to content creation—like uploading a photo with a review—the brand gains social proof that supports conversion and AOV while simultaneously deepening the customer's commitment to the store.

For brands that are scaling, looking at real examples from brands improving retention can provide a roadmap for how to transition from individual apps to a unified system. These customer stories that show how teams reduce app sprawl often highlight the relief of having one support team to contact and one interface to learn.

Furthermore, an integrated approach provides a clearer view of total retention-stack costs. Instead of multiple unpredictable invoices that fluctuate based on different metrics (orders, customers, or volume), a single platform allows for better financial planning. Before making a final choice, checking merchant feedback and app-store performance signals can help ensure the chosen platform has the historical reliability to support a growing business.

Conclusion

For merchants choosing between BON Loyalty Program & Rewards and 99minds Gift Card & Loyalty, the decision comes down to the specific operational gaps in the current stack. BON Loyalty is the superior choice for merchants who need a highly customizable, developer-friendly loyalty program that supports multi-language stores and wholesale (B2B) structures. Its focus is on the traditional loyalty mechanics of points and tiers, polished for a global audience.

On the other hand, 99minds Gift Card & Loyalty is better suited for merchants who view gift cards and store credit as their primary retention levers. By combining loyalty with automated refund workflows, it addresses the financial side of retention that many other apps ignore. It is a practical choice for stores with a heavy emphasis on giftable products or those struggling with the overhead of cash refunds.

However, as a store matures, the limitations of using separate apps for loyalty, reviews, and referrals often become apparent. Tool sprawl can lead to a disjointed customer journey and increased maintenance time for the marketing team. An integrated platform offers a way to bypass these issues, providing a more cohesive experience for the customer and a more efficient workflow for the merchant.

By consolidating these functions, brands can ensure their retention strategy is more than just a collection of features—it becomes a unified engine for growth. Before committing to a specific path, verifying compatibility details in the official app listing ensures the tool will grow alongside the business.

To reduce app fatigue and run retention from one place, start by reviewing the Shopify App Store listing merchants install from.

FAQ

Which app is better for an international Shopify store?

BON Loyalty Program & Rewards is generally better for international stores due to its built-in multi-language display features. This allows merchants to translate the loyalty experience for different regions, which is essential for maintaining trust in global markets. While 99minds offers a robust feature set, the multi-language capabilities of BON are more prominently highlighted for cross-border commerce.

Can 99minds replace a dedicated gift card app?

Yes, 99minds is specifically designed to handle both loyalty and a full gift card program, including physical and e-gift cards. For merchants currently paying for a separate gift card application and a loyalty application, 99minds offers a way to consolidate those costs and manage both functions from a single dashboard.

Does BON Loyalty support headless commerce?

BON Loyalty provides support for headless commerce through its Professional plan, which includes a Software Development Toolkit (SDK) and full API access. This makes it a strong candidate for Shopify Plus merchants using Hydrogen or other custom frontend frameworks who need to integrate loyalty logic into a non-liquid storefront.

How does an all-in-one platform compare to specialized apps?

An all-in-one platform reduces the technical overhead of managing multiple integrations and ensures that data flows seamlessly between different retention modules like loyalty, reviews, and wishlists. While specialized apps may offer very niche features, a platform provides a more consistent user experience and a single point of support, which often leads to a better return on investment as a store scales.